Mrs Roy

We’re going on a ………hunt!

Wow I can’t believe it’s Friday again, what a busy week we’ve had in P1R!

In reading this week we have been focusing on revising all the sounds we have learned and blending sounds together to make CVC words. We have used a variety of approaches and resources to do this, Miss Smyth even paid us a visit and spent the morning observing us as we worked. She was very impressed at how well the children used the apps on the ipad and their classroom displays as a tool for learning.

Maths has been great fun as we continued to learn about shapes, this week we looked at 3D shapes and spent lots of time exploring the shapes using our sense of touch and sight. We played games on the smartboard, went on a shape hunt, played shape bingo and dominoes and even wrote detailed descriptions for each of the shapes in our writing lesson.

In IDL we looked at how pirates defended themselves when at sea and how they used different weapons in battles. Everyone chose a weapon they would like to make using junk or recycled materials. We have put these on display for everyone to look at, hopefully we won’t have to use them too often!! On Wednesday we went outdoors for learning on a pirate scavenger hunt, we had to listen carefully to the clues and then go and look for evidence of pirates in our school grounds. We worked in two teams and chose names and captains for our crew – The Jolly Rodger and The Squeaky Sail. It was lovely to see everyone working together and helping one another in their search. The fun continued on Thursday when Mr Hunter asked us to create our very own sea monsters which were often a feature in pirate stories. We again took the learning outdoors for this and the children created fantastic monsters! Harry loved making the weapons and pirate play, Matthew enjoyed making weapons and Angelina liked finding pirate things in the school garden.

For Catholic Education Week we spent time discussing how we could show mercy to others, the children enjoyed watching the Pope Francis animation and all produced their very own Hands of Mercy for a whole school display.

Finally we finished off the week with an Achievements Assembly and our committees. Oma was awarded a special certificate for being a reflective learner – well done Oma! When asked how she felt she said, ” I felt really good.”

Well as I said at the beginning of the entry, it’s been a busy week! We’re all looking forward to next week when we have Technologies Week as our focus and Lent begins.

Sailing on the seven seas…

What a hardworking crew we have in P1R, it’s been another busy week!

At the beginning of the week we had a visit from our local librarian, Mrs Campbell to read us a story, we all had to vote for a book which she then read to us. We’re hoping to visit the library shortly to have a look at all the other books they have.

In maths we started a new topic learning all about shapes, we spent lots of time exploring 2D shapes. We used the feely bag to try and feel the shapes then describe them to our partners. We sorted shapes using the smartboard and flashcards, Mrs Roy was amazed at how quickly we could sort them! Our challenge of the week was to think of other 2D shapes and where we might see them in the environment.

We received another letter from Captain Pete this week who was delighted with the applications we had completed for homework to join his crew. He asked us to build our very own ship to use on our Pirate Adventure which we were really excited about. We had to learn about the different parts of a ship and try to recreate this in our design. Our crew have had great fun using the ship for pirate play. We also learned about Pirate life and spent an afternoon trying out some activities which pirates would do in their spare time – playing music, dancing, making things out of wood, playing cards, reading, etc.

The Olympics are beckoning for some of our budding gymnasts, we were are getting really good now at using the large apparatus. This week we focused on being responsible, leadership and core strength.

We ended the week with Ninian’s Natter where every child had a learning conversation to discuss their goals and progress. I will send a photograph to the parents who were unable to make it today of your child with their goal. You can use this as a tool for discussion at home.

A pirate’s life for me homework task.

Next week the children in both P1 classes are being asked to spend an evening in role as a pirate. We have been learning about what a pirate does to keep them busy or entertained. Ask your child about what they have learned. We’d love it if you could post a description of how you spent the evening for us all to read in class.

Here are some ideas:

Pirate dances

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6luwLbVftoI

Playing cards.

Reading or making up pirate stories.

Making things out of wood.

Making pirate food.

Enjoy me hearties and remember to leave us a comment below!!

Wanted…harrrd sailin’ children…last seen in P1R!!

Ahoy there mateys, good to see ye all!

It’s been a grand ole week in P1R with lots of learning and fun. It all began on Monday when we learned a new sound, ‘ai’, we’re flying through the sounds now and getting better every day at blending. We used letterjoin to practise joining the a and i together to remind us that even though it is two letters it only makes one sound.

In maths we continued the sharing theme but focused on learning all about fractions/halves. Chocolate was aplenty in our lessons, we were given a challenge of working out how to share 1 mini-roll with our partners, we decided to cut them in half meaning each person got 1 piece. On another day we looked at whole chocolate bars and counted all the square pieces, we then had to work out half. We even found out that half of 5 is 2.5!! The best bit was getting to eat our share of the chocolate!

We also had a go at making fraction flags using 2 colours and decorating half a pizza (don’t worry they were pretend pizzas!)

In PE we were trying to combine the skills we had been learning and apply this to the different apparatus.

Famous pirates were the talk of the class this week. We learned all about Blackbeard and Anne Bonny. Ask your child to tell you one of the facts they found out. We made Wanted Posters for our class display, puppets and pirate hats for role play, sang Pirate songs, danced like a pirate, wrote some facts about famous pirates and used the Morfo app to create talking and moving pirates.

Outdoor learning was also part of our week although unfortunately the rain changed this slightly, we brought the outdoors indoors! All the children were set a challenge by Mr Hunter to make a ‘Crow’s Nest’. They had to think about which of our school values would be important, the children thought ‘teamwork’ would be the best way to approach the challenge.

We’re all now looking forward to tomorrow’s skills academies and going along to the dress rehearsal of the ‘Great Scots’ show!

Ahoy me hearties!!!

It’s been all systems go this week in P1R as we continued our Pirate Adventure. The children enjoyed learning about the different jobs pirates did when they were on their ship, made pirate portraits using oil pastels, sang pirate songs, did some pirate dancing, started our pirate displays with P1D and chose facts to write about and illustrate. In reading they heard about the adventures of Captain Pugwash and had fun finding examples of VCOP in the story. Ask your child to tell you all about Punctuation Parrot, he has been helping us recognise different punctuation marks in stories. In writing they had to complete the sentence, “If I were a pirate…”, there were some super ideas:

Ahmad – I would have a battle with other ships and shoot the cannon.

Matthew – I would have a ship race.

Elenta – I would fight the pirates and push them in the water.

Ryan – I would drink rum (I think Mrs Gardner liked this answer the best)!

Why don’t you ask the children to teach you this song, they even made up some actions for it!

In phonics we learned all about ‘l’ and ‘r’ having a go at blending the sounds to make words, writing the sounds using letterjoin, finding objects that began with the sounds and lots more!

Sharing continued to be the focus in maths and the children have picked this concept up really quickly, we all had fun sharing out the pasta and toys and playing interactive sharing games on the smartboard. We also met some pirates who needed to share out the treasure they had captured!

Try some of the games they’re good fun! Here are the links:

http://pbskids.org/curiousgeorge/busyday/dogs/

http://www.topmarks.co.uk/Flash.aspx?f=sharingv2

In PE we developed our gymnastics skills and started transferring last week’s floor work to apparatus. The children were amazed when Mrs Roy was able to demonstrate a forward roll to the class (I amazed myself!!!!) Well done to all the children who were finding this difficult to begin with, they persevered and by the end of the week everyone could do a forward roll!

In RE we learned about the importance of speaking to God, we revised how to make the sign of the cross properly and learned how to say the ‘Our Father’. We were asking children of other religions how they prayed and next week Ahmad is going to teach us a new prayer which we are all looking forward to.

We also got some good news on Friday, congratulations goes to Matthew who was a winner in the road safety competition organised by the JRSO, we were all really proud of him! This week we took part in a Robert Burns colouring in competition for Morrisons, fingers crossed we do well!

Next Friday we will be starting our Skills Academy, all the children selected a skill they would like to develop, the choices were amazing, we’ll tell you more next week.

P1R are going to blow your socks off this year!!

Happy New Year to everyone, we’ve had a very busy start to the year in P1R!

In maths we have started a new topic – division. We have been learning how to share objects fairly and had great fun sharing out sweets and toys.

On Wednesday we received a mystery message in a bottle, we were very puzzled and came up with lots of suggestions as to be what it could be and how it got in our classroom:

Maeve thought it might be a letter from Trex, Ahmad thought it was a special letter, Angelina thought it was a letter from a pirate because that’s what pirates do!

When we read it we discovered it was from Pirate Pete Pigeon, he has asked us to join him on his pirate adventures and we accepted immediately. Here is the plan we made with all of our ideas.

In PE we started a gymnastics block of learning and teaching, this week we were focusing on travelling and balance.

As this week was Vision and Values week we spent a lot of time discussing our school values and what makes our school unique. The children selected one of the values to illustrate in their Learning Journal. We also made a new class charter and used the theme of pirates to make a fantastic entrance display to our class.

In writing we had to think of how we were ‘going to blow your socks off in 2016’, there were some super ideas:

Oma is going to exercise more and become really fit.

Maeve is going to have the neatest handwriting.

Ahmad said we were going to be the best behaved class in the school ( I think we’re already that!!!)

Party time for P1R

Great fun was had by all at today’s Christmas Party, the children danced their socks off! Check your dojo messages for individual photographs!

Read all about it!!

The school newspaper committee will be selling the December issue of ‘Awesome News’ every day this week for 50p a copy. They are really proud of what they have achieved this term in their committee time and can’t wait to share it with you. All proceeds raised will go to a charity chosen by the committee.

The end is near….

This week has been very busy in and out of school. Well done to all the children for being such fantastic performers at our 3 Nativity shows! Photos will be uploaded by Mrs Purdie.

In class we enjoyed playing a game called Hit the Button, we had to try and find the doubles as quickly as we could.

In reading we worked independently to unscramble the words and make sentences. The challenge was then to read our sentences!

We continued to learn more about science this week using our Talking Book and focused on electricity. We used a super website to learn about electrical safety in our homes then we had to find the hazards hiding in the picture.

Friday was dress as your future job day and we had some great outfits, keep an eye on the school facebook page to see them all, here is a sneak preview of some our ours…

Homework help

As this week is Nativity week we will not be issuing any homework to the children. I have posted a few websites and activities which you may like to try if your child is desperately eager to work at home!

This game is being used in class this week to practise doubles – Doubles game.

Have a listen to this song which we learned last week, it helps us remember how to work out more than and less than – Alligator song.

In literacy we have been revising all the sounds we know and trying to build words, try out this Phonics game.

As part of our science work we are learning about electricity and how to stay safe, this is a great website with lots of activities you can do at home, Staying safe with electricity.

In RE we are discussing how important it is to prepare for the birth of baby Jesus, here is the Nativity story – Nativity.

Let me know how you get on by posting your thoughts on our blog page! Have fun!!